‘true growth and spiritual maturity often occurs when you stop believing in a toxic and destructive image of God…that may look like atheism, but it’s more accurately simply a denial of a god who isn’t worth believing in or following in the first place.’
— rob bell

have you seen the ‘noah’ movie yet? in its opening weekend, the poetic tale of genesis chapters 6-9 brought in $43.7 million, topping the box office. in just two weeks, it’s earned nearly $200 million.

the tweet is from kevin deyoung, a prolific blogger, preacher and author who has about 42,000 more twitter followers than me. he writes for The Gospel Coalition, which was rated one of the top 25 christian blogs for ministry in a recent analysis. his personal blog, DeYoung, Restless and Reformeddid even better, landing at #12.

that’s a lot of readers. a lot of influence. a lot of responsibility.

the hashtag referenced in the tweet, #T4G14, stands for ‘Together for the Gospel‘ a well attended biennial conference for pastors and church leaders with big name speakers such as john piper, al mohler, david platt, matt chandler, john macarthur, mark dever (whose talk was quoted in the tweet) and… kevin deyoung.

these guys are professional gospel proclaimers with huge platforms, teaching at a conference all about the proclamation of that same good news.

at the beginning of the year, i mentioned here on the blog an incredible opportunity for youth workers to come be a part of an inaugural conference here in chicago. providing a safe and sacred place for progressive youth pastors and workers to plot, scheme and collude with one another, The Jopa Group and Fourth Presbyterian Church in chicago created the Progressive Youth Ministry Conference (you can join the facebook group here beginning monday, april 14). the diverse line-up of speakers gave voice to three themes, represented in each plenary session :: theology, sexuality and faith formation.

one of those talks was quite possibly the most raw, honest, vulnerable and powerful i’ve ever experienced.

my inboxes have been flooded, my text messages continuous and my face to face conversations with members of both the LGBT and conservative communities have been seemingly endless – and emotionally charged.

one friend said he was saddened by the fact that his (gay) community has been marginalized yet again and treated as not only ‘Other’ but unworthy – another friend used the term ‘useless’ after acknowledging he is a gay christian. Continue Reading…

‘I think that we all need to start with grace and compassion. Set the issues, beliefs and convictions aside and let’s see one another as we truly are : God’s children in need of His grace. I believe the church and other Christian ministries and organizations like World Vision are being robbed of the incredible contributions that LGBT people can make. There are so many incredible gifts, talents and abilities that were God-given that are being unused and de-valued because of the labels we place on one another.’

see more of my conversation with my friend tim schraeder on why he decided to come out as a gay christian here.

‘Jesus frequently showed respect to ‘sinners’ publicly (John 8:10) and even ate with them (Luke 19:2-10; Mark 2:16-17). In doing so, he was openly dismissing the ego made honor/shame system. He not only ignored it, he even went publicly in the opposite direction.

That preachers and theologians have failed to see this is culpable ignorance.’
— richard rohr

less than 48 hours after announcing it would hire gay christians in legal same-sex marriages, World Vision has reversed its decision calling it ‘a mistake’ – no doubt a response to the outcry of many evangelicals resulting in the dropped sponsorship of over 2,000 children. Continue Reading…